Barbara Gordon
History Early Life Barbara Gordon is the daughter of Jim Gordon and Sarah-Essen Gordon. She also has a younger brother named Jimmy Gordon, Jr. and a cousin turned surrogate-sister named Carrie Kelley. At a young age she became obsessed with her father's police work. She dreamed of becoming a police officer. She would force her siblings to play cops and robbers when they were younger. I don't think it's hard to guess who the robbers were. At night when she and her siblings were sent to bed she'd put her ear up against the thin walls in their house to listen to the horrible stories her parents dealt with throughout the day. She was both horrified and intrigued. Criminal investigation wasn't the only thing that Babs loved growing up, computers were also a huge part of upbringing. At a young age she had a knack for computers not just their use, but deciphering codes. By the time she was ten she was a self-trained hacker. She even became a Hacktivist, before Hacktivists were really a thing. She was what was known as a "White Hat" which is a fancy term for good guy. As a teenager she stowed away in the back of her dad's squad car in hopes to hack in to the GCPD's database, but instead she found out her dad lied to her mom that night and instead had a secret meeting at an undisclosed location with Gotham's Great Mystery. She kept quiet, never telling her dad that she was there, and never telling her mom that her dad lied. The next week Carmine Falcone, Sal Maroni, and Carl Grissom were convicted with charges that somehow stuck. The following day Jim Gordon was promoted from Desk Sergeant to Lieutenant, and shortly the her father outed the corrupted police commissioner where he then took his place. Within a couple of months the Gotham Gazette finally had caught a picture of the "Bat-Man" and just like that Gotham was just as obsessed with the bat vigilante as she was. She convinced her date to let her enroll in a self-defense class. After watching videos and news stories on the Batman she realized that a few karate lessons from the Rec Center and a few visits a week from the gym weren't going to be enough to stop crime. So naturally she lied about a joining a few more extracurricular activities and enrolled herself in more self-defense classes such as, Aikido, Stick-Fighting, Judo, and Jiu-Jitsu, as well as some boxing lessons at the Wildcat Gym. By the time Barbara was a Freshman in High School, news had surfaced that Batman had been working with a teenage sidekick all these years. What was believed to be, roughly around the age of 13, a boy named who went by Robin. Babs decided it was time for a girl to step in, so fabricating a homemade suit, using her self-taught detective and hacking skills as well as Batman copycat gadgets, she traded her black belt for a utility belt. Batgirl Begins Barbara Gordon took to the streets of Gotham City as Batgirl. Things started out pretty slow for her. She could barely find crime, because she wasn't the only the hero that Gotham had protecting it. She had to compete with Batman, Robin, Huntress, and Question. She managed to find some low-tier crimes such as street theft, small assaults, and resturaunt robberies. Nothing big ever came her way. Batgirl was never discouraged by this, she understood that Batman and Robin would always beat them to the good stuff since they had a means of transportation, you know, the Batmobile. She was just antsy. Finally she ran into some of Penguin's goons transporting illegal military-grade weapons. Batgirl interrupted the men and started to take them down, fairly well. Everything went great until, to her surprise, Penguin showed up. He gave her a few cracked ribs, and a busted lip, but nothing too bad. Despite his criminal history, Oswald can still be quite the gentleman. He wasn't raised in a barn. Penguin aimed his umbrella to put Batgirl out of her misery, but Babs kicked his umbrella out her face, kicked Penguin in the balls and sprung back up. She realized she was to injured to put up a fight, so she fled and made an anonymous call to 911 alerting them of Penguin's business. That night Penguin was arrested and taken to Arkham Asylum. The bust caught the attention of a certain Dynamic Duo, it only took them a few hours of research to deduce the identity of this "mysterious" Batgirl. They paid her a visit in the middle of her next patrol. She specifically remembers Bruce giving her his words of warning, "Stay out of this Barbara, it's far too dangerous for the daughter of a police officer." She still isn't sure whether his intention was to scare her away from this life...but Bruce didn't know her then as well as he does now. As her wounds mended she set her sights on one of Gotham's biggest criminal organizations, the Red Hood Gang. She used her lunch break during school to study the gang in the school library computer lab, when a kid who didn't attend her school slipped her a note and had her follow him to a chauffeured car where she met billionaire Bruce Wayne, and his trusty butler Alfred Pennyworth. Bruce told Barbara that he was aware of her research and knew she was not going to quit anytime soon. So he made her a deal. He would give her a computer with unlimited access, an armored suit, and crime-fighting training, as long as she wait for her wounds to completely heal up. Barbara stated that it was the longest couple of weeks in her life. Batgirl 2.0 Barbara had finally recovered from her wounds, Batman kept his promise and not only did he finally give her permission to continue patrol duty, but he even supplied her with an armored Kevlar-weave and body suit form fitted to her dimensions. She still wonders how he managed to make it form-fitting, EVERYWHERE. While healing Barbara became rusty when it came to combat. Bruce and Dick helped train to not only back to her original state, but far better than before. When she wasn't training she was stationed on the Bat-Computer. At first Bruce was hesitant, and a little protective, but after seeing her do her work he openly admitted that she was the best hacker he'd ever seen. Nowadays Felicity would argue with her and often make competitions out of their hacking ability, but Babs would always come out on top. Her first few weeks in the Batcave were spent narrowing down the whereabouts of the Red Hood Gang and finding out where they were going to strike next. They figured out that the Red Hoods were planning to rob Ace Chemicals Plant of a new chemical compound that could create a chemical weapon that would bring Gotham to it's knees. The was her first major team-up with Batman and Robin. A battle ensued between Batman and the Red Hood Gang's leader. He pulled a knife on Batman and began flailing about. He and Batman were moving across the catwalk, each time he lunged Batman would take another step back dodging the blade. Batman's final dodge led the Red Hood Gang's leader to fall forward nearly throwing himself into a vat of toxic chemicals. Batman grabbed him stalling his demise, but nobody could have predicted what happened next. The leader was crazy enough to slash Batman's left arm causing Batman to let go of the leader causing him to free fall into the vat of chemicals. The last that was scene of the body was it's skin melting off of it. As Batgirl, Babs saw quite a bit of action. The rise of Gotham's most notorious villains happened shortly after she donned the cape and cowl, in what was known as the "Long Halloween" (due to the fact it all started on Halloween night with Riddler and Mr. Freeze and continued for several months like a mass of costumed freaks coming into light.) She was there for Harvey Dent's acid bath that caused him to go mad and turn into Two-Face, and she also got to become an unofficial member of the short-lived "Super Friends" (the name Flash came up with for the team that consisted of him, Superman, Batman, Wonder Woman, Green Arrow, and Black Canary, Robin, and herself before the big invasion that formed the official Justice League. Which Black Canary didn't join at first.) She also became a member of the second iteration of the Young Justice team. Young Justice Barbara Gordon wasn't aware of Young Justice or "The Team" when it first sprouted. She wasn't even Batgirl yet, but when the time came for a new team to come along she didn't hesitate to join. This team at the time was led by the third Robin, Tim Drake, and consisted of a few other young heroes. This team is where Babs met Cassie Sandsmark and sprouted an amazing friendship. There weren't a whole lot of teenage girl heroes outside of Batgirl. She had Donna Troy, the original Wonder Girl, but she couldn't really connect with her like she had hoped. While on The Team the romance between Dick Grayson and Barbara Gordon grew. Barbara Gordon and Dick Grayson Barbara Gordon wasn't too fond of Dick at first. She thought he was arrogant and couldn't take anything seriously, plus he knew how "sexy" he was and wouldn't let it go. By the time they were about 15 Barbara started to see Dick in a different light, she claims it's because Dick Grayson finally matured a bit. Throughout the year they had a very on-and-off again romance, but never fully committed to each other. She wasn't sure she was ready to commit. The following year Dick started up the Teen Titans again. During that year Dick became unsure of whether Barbara was into, so he just decided to end it. He then fell for Koriand'r a few weeks later. This hurt Barbara a lot. You could see it in her crime-fighting, she became a little bit more brutal. Finally cooling down Babs began focusing on herself. She traded in the Batgirl suit, Bruce made her for something that made her feel a little more independent and free. When Dick finally emerged as Nightwing, she felt he was copying her. She went back to The Team under Miss Martian's leadership with Nightwing focusing on Gamma Squad. They didn't see each other much, because of that, but once again, after Teen Titans dispersed once again, Barbara fell for that Grayson charm and now she and Dick are happier than they could ever be. Oracle Information Coming Soon... Powers and Abilities Trivia and Notes Links and References Category:Characters Category:Heroes Category:Vigilantes Category:Humans Category:Gotham City Residents Category:Happy Harbor Residents Category:Batman, Inc. Members Category:Birds of Prey Members Category:Helix Members Category:Young Justice Members Category:Tech Support Category:Prime Era Category:Beyond Era